In general, in a silver halide color photographic light-sensitive material used for a color negative and/or a color print, the light-sensitive layers thereof contain three kinds of silver halide emulsions sensitized so that they have sensitivities to a blue color, a green color and a red color, and the layers are coated on a support in a multilayer constitution. With such materials dyes having different hues according to the light sensitivities of the respective light-sensitive layers, for example, yellow, magenta and cyan dyes, are formed, whereby a color image can be reproduced by a subtractive color method.
Phenol series and naphthol series coupler are known as couplers which can be used in a silver halide color photographic light-sensitive material for a color print. However, several problems are involved in the storing performance of a cyan dye image obtained by using these couplers. For example, there used to be involved the problem that dyes obtained from 2-acylaminophenol cyan couplers described in U.S. Pat. No. 2,367,531 generally had an inferior heat fastness and that dyes obtained from 2,5-diacylaminophenol cyan couplers described in U.S. Pat. No. 2,895,826 generally had an inferior light fastness. Further, dyes obtained from the couplers described in U.S. Pat. Nos. 3,446,622 and 4,333,999 generally have an inferior light fastness and the 1-hydroxy-2-naphthoamide cyan couplers described therein are generally insufficient in terms of both light and heat fastnesses.
Meanwhile, the development of the novel couplers, against these prior couplers, had been promoted for the purpose of obtaining a color photographic light-sensitive material that provided excellent color reproduction and color development and a superior image storing performance. There can be enumerated, for example, the 3-hydroxypyridine series compounds described in European Patent Publication 333,185, 3H-2-dicyanomethylidene-thiazoles described in European Patent Publication 362,808, 3-dicyanomethylidene-2,3-dihydrobenzothiophene-1,1-dioxides described in JP-A-64-32260 (the term "JP-A" as used herein means an unexamined published Japanese patent application), pyrazoloazoles described in JP-A-63-264753 and U.S. Pat. No. 4,873,183, imidazoles described in U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,818,672 and 4,921,783 and JP-A-3-48243, pyralzolopyrimidones and pyrazoloquinazolones described in European Patent Publications 304,001 and 329,036 and JP-A-2-85851, and condensed triazoles described in European Patent Publication 342,637.
These couplers can be used in a color reproduction by improving a hue. However, it is difficult in many cases to obtain both a satisfactory dye image fastness and a coupling reaction activity, at the same time.
Against these problems in the cyan dye image, there are disclosed methods in which cyclic ether compounds or the epoxy group-containing compounds are used to improve a dye image-storing performance, for example, in JP-B-58-45017 (the term "JP-B" as used herein means an examined Japanese patent publication), JP-A-62-75447, JP-A-62-129853, JP-A-62-172353, JP-A-62-198859, JP-A-62-196657, JP-A-64-21447, JP-A-64-23255, JP-A-3-192374, and JP-A-3-223755. However, the investigation performed to improve the fastness of the cyan dye image with these compounds has resulted in finding several problems. For example, while these compounds have the improved effects to light and heat fastness in a phenol series or naphthol series coupler, it has become apparent that the effects thereof sometimes are reduced by half according to the condition of a processing solution in which the light-sensitive material containing these compounds is subjected to a color development.
In recent years, rapidity and low replenishing have strongly been required in the development processing of silver halide light-sensitive materials. Particularly in fields in which it is required to finish a lot of prints for a short period as in the development processing of a light-sensitive material for a color print, a simplification and the rapidity in a processing have been promoted. In recent years, particularly requirements for the protection of the environment have led to requirements for a reduction in the amount of processing waste, that is, a low replenishing.
Where a continuous processing is carried out with a processing solution having a reduced replenishing amount of a developing solution, it has become apparent that the dye image fastness-improving effect of the epoxy compound described above is deteriorated and therefore the development of techniques with which a print having an excellent dye image fastness can be provided has become an important object.